Three Leaves Left
by Phoenix Down1
Summary: --Volume III of the Sun series--
1. The Man With the Slicked Black Hair

Three Leaves Left  
  
Volume III of the Sun series.  
  
  
  
  
  
"The Shin-Ra Eddie Bower," lord of the fashion retail industry, once played a Vincent Valentine re-mix in their store outlets.  
  
The clothing store chain that decides what's hip, and what's not, sparked a musical chord with it's young customers.  
Thousands of their customers and employees heard the late Vincent Valentine for the first time, generating a boost in "Nightmares Under the Stairs" record   
sales.  
  
The same re-mixed song was played frequently in a Volkswagen commercial.  
  
Yuffie was pleased to read in the paper, under the Entertainment section, that there was a strong boost in Vincent Valentine records being sold. Although, it was a mystery to her on why this was happening out of the blue. She was glad that his memory was living on.  
  
After Vincent's death, Yuffie noticed a huge shift in her personality.  
  
She thought, finally, she was growing up. Perhaps Vincent would have been pleased with her. She was no longer the little brat who used to steal materia.  
No.  
She got her first real job.  
  
Yuffie lives in Wutai, now, not at all far from her father.  
  
She works as a server in the bar of Wutai. Whenever a customer gives her attitude, however, she has no issue resorting to her childish ways, and spits in their drinks.  
She speaks to her father and younger brother at least once a week. They were still getting over their differences.  
  
  
There was a regular who came to her bar.  
He always requested her as his server.  
His bald head, and dark sunglasses seemed somehow familiar to her.  
He wore a flannel jacket, and hardly ever spoke.  
  
Yuffie swore that she knew him form somewhere, but never made a deal of it.  
  
  
~  
  
  
"Oh! Look! He has your eyes, Cloud!"  
Cloud proudly placed his hand upon Tifa's shoulder.  
"He has my eyes, but, he looks more like your brother."  
"Yes. Poor Vincent. Too bad he can't see him." Tifa gazed into the child's slimy face.  
The doctor reluctantly took the child from Tifa.  
  
Tifa, relived and exhausted, laid back into the pillow.   
She watched with half-closed eyes as the doctor placed the child onto a steel table, and took out a butchers cleaver.  
  
"N... no! What is he- what is he doing to my baby..." Tifa felt herself half falling asleep.  
Cloud simply stood beside her bed, and watched.  
  
The doctor lifted the knife, and down came the huge, steel blade.  
"This child is a freak of nature!" Cried one, round, greasy and olive faced nurse.  
  
Tifa's baby, a small, purplish creature with a huge, green fish head, flopped around like an inverted mermaid on the table.  
It's button, beady-fish-eyes went still as the doctor sliced it's head off.  
  
Tifa began to cry.  
  
  
Then, she woke up.  
  
  
Her pillow was a cold, wet puddle, soaked all the way into the sheets.  
Horrible, horrible nightmares, abut the baby being a monster.  
  
She touched her belly. It was a child, part Cloud, part her, nothing more.  
A baby boy.  
  
No fish heads.  
  
As she sat up, she suddenly felt incredibly nauseated.  
She hated being sick in the morning.  
  
Then, it came to her. The worry. The stress. The sadness.  
  
Vincent.  
  
Poor, poor Vincent. It never left her. When she slept, she would forget.  
But she always woke up again.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
It came to her as a blow in the head. Yuffie told Cid, last they spoke. Cid told Tifa. It went around like wildfire.  
She never knew him well. She never had the chance.  
Red said that he was sad, but, not at all shocked. Red said that he seemed depressed since the day they met. Red was sure that he was not sad anymore.  
Still, Tifa thought.  
  
How horrible. Yuffie was there. Why didn't Yuffie try to stop him?! Tifa didn't understand. Oh, well, Tifa thought. No use in blaming anyone. It's too late now.  
Vincent committed suicide.  
He would have done it weather she was there or not. Once someone makes that decision, there really isn't any stopping them.  
Red was right, perhaps. Vincent is in the Lifestream with Aeris and their mother, now.  
  
Vincent and Tifa... shared the same mother.   
  
Tifa sniffed, and pushed her palm across her eyes. She was due any day now. The baby was a boy, Tifa's woman intuition was right. A life leaves, only to be replaced.  
Cloud and Tifa couldn't agree on a name.  
  
Tifa sat on their bed, feeling the baby kick her ribs, and lean in on her bladder. She struggled to stand, and head for the bathroom.  
Cloud wanted to name him, Paul.  
Tifa said that she wanted to call him, Keter, a name that she made up, but rather liked. Now, she reconsidered. She wanted to name him after her late half-brother.   
Tifa slipped off her maternity panties, and went.  
  
She could feel the stretch marks and varicose veins under her swollen belly. Her ankles hurt. Her feet hurt. Her heart ached.  
  
Why did he have to do it? There were so many things that she wanted to tell him.  
  
Tifa finished, stood and washed her hands.   
  
A light breeze drifted in through the small, bathroom window. Autumn was coming, back in Niblehiem. They didn't ever have a proper autumn here is Costa del Sol. They only had a rainy season, and a sunny season.  
No autumn, Tifa's favorite.  
  
It was beautiful in Niblehiem, when the leaves began to change.  
She was sure that Vincent would know about that- he spent so much time in the mansion, there, watching her grow up, perhaps.  
She didn't know, honestly, she would like to think that he saw her there.  
  
Tifa dried her hands, and touched her belly. Keter wasn't kicking anymore.  
  
Tifa looked into the mirror, in the bathroom that the afternoon sunlight slid through.  
Tifa barely recognized herself. She didn't look bad, just, older. She didn't look like the young Tifa in a sports bra who could take on the world, and run a dilapidated bar in the underbelly of Midgar and be a member of AVALANCHE.  
Her shine was still there, though, but it was somehow softer.  
  
Her chestnut eyes, and shiny long brown locks. They weren't sexy, now, but, maternal. She looked like a mother.  
She liked it.  
  
It made her feel like an adult, finally.  
She looked down at her belly.  
  
~  
  
  
  
  
Reno couldn't get her out of his head.  
  
Sephris.   
  
The result of Aeris and Jenova/Sephiroth cells.  
  
The most powerful force in the universe.  
  
Far stronger than the Lifestream.  
  
She speaks to the Earth.  
  
She is part Cetra.  
  
Her kiss was like jasmine flowers. She smelt like a pine forest on a summers night.  
Did... he love...  
  
No.  
  
And even if he did, he thought to himself, she wouldn't love him back. It was stupid. The whole thing was so STUPID. She was taught to hate humans by that monster father of hers.  
Reno kicked a sticky, brown beer bottle across his filthy apartment rug.  
It cracked, but didn't shatter, against the gray, dusty wall.  
Reno lit a cigarette.  
  
He didn't want to be in love. He was getting too old for that. He hadn't had a proper girlfriend since Bunny. And before that, that bitch, Elena.  
Was he just infatuated with her? Did he need sex?  
No... not really. A man could do without if he knew what he was doing.  
  
Reno sighed, and went over to pick up the beer bottle.   
Maybe Rude was right. Maybe he was finally coming to terms with being... just... plain 'ol lonely.   
Being a bachelor was harder than it looked.  
Maybe he isn't in denial anymore. Everybody needs somebody, eh, Reno?-He thought to himself.  
  
Reno tossed the bottle into the overfilling trash in his kitchen.  
  
After doing so, he took a good, long, look around.  
  
"You need to get it together, Reno." He spoke out loud to himself as a long snake of gray ash dripped off the end of his cigarette. It splattered onto his sticky kitchen floor.  
Reno opened a near-black-wooden cupboard door.  
  
"Fuck. I don't even have a bottle of cleaning shit to BEGIN. Eh.. well. I gotta go to the drugstore anyway."   
  
Reno snubbed his cigarette out in the steel kitchen sink. The dirty dishes were piled AROUND it on the counter, as if they were creatures painfully avoiding anything remotely clean.  
  
Reno sighed, stretched, itched his ass, put on his holy green bathrobe that didn't even know what a washing machine looked like, and slipped on a pair of beat up sandals.  
He was going out, today.  
  
"I become more and more of a slob every day." He thought out loud to himself as he caught a glimpse of his messy appearance on the dusty television screen.  
  
  
  
As he lazily walked with his shoulders slouched, and his hands limply hanging inside of his bathrobe pockets, he headed for the drugstore.  
A lot of people in Midgar went out looking somewhat like he did.  
Some of them were worse.  
Some of them were homeless, however.  
  
He didn't care. He was lazy, and he knew it.  
  
A bit of him was satisfied with it, though.  
It most certainly is a guy thing.  
  
Reno headed into the drug store, and took a few bottles of cleaning supplies off of the shelf. Then, he meandered into the cool, dry, dairy department, and picked up a carton of milk.  
He stuck his nose into it, first, making sure that it was fresh.  
  
"Hey, man."  
Reno lifted his nose from the red and white carton of milk. He ran his rough hand over his concave countenance- whose chin was smothered in rough, sand like hair.  
The grimacing cartoon cow on the milk carton stared blankly at the man near Reno.  
  
"Do I know you?" Reno asked the man.  
  
"We've met before." Replied the clean cut man with jet black hair.  
  
"Yeah, well, fuck, you know. I've met a lot of people in my time, you know, I forget faces." Reno replied as he lowered his milk carton.  
  
"Yeah? Me too. We worked in Shin-Ra together." The man said.  
  
"Shin-Ra, huh? Well, you weren't a Turk flunky, were you? We've had a few come in and die out real quick. Folks who couldn't cut it." Reno's cat-green eyes cut through the thin, tall man with dark hair and fine, navy blue suit. He LOOKED like he could have been a Turk at some point.  
  
"Turk? Me? No. Fact, I still work for them."  
  
"Yeah? What department?"  
  
"Toy department." Smirked the man. His smile was as clean and as sharp as the rest of him.  
  
"Oh. Yeah. Well, you know," Reno stopped, feeling a bubble come up. He closed his mouth for a small belch that partially slipped past his lips. "'Scuse me. But, I kinda got shit to do. What was your name?" Reno asked.   
  
The man didn't reply, only turned around, and walked swiftly past the dairy aisle, as if their conversation was already over before Reno had said anything.  
  
Reno shrugged, and thought nothing more of it.  
Reno thought the clean-cut man with jet black hair was a prick, anyway. Maybe the man judged him for his slob appearance.  
  
Reno paid for his things with a nearly maxed out credit card, and headed home.  
He was going to clean for the first time since he moved in, and not do a half-assed job on it, either.  
  
  
Then, it occurred to Reno.  
  
"Hey, HEY, man, WAIT!"  
  
But the tall, thin man with jet-black hair and a nice suit-was gone.  
  
~ 


	2. Highflying Highwind

Three Leaves Left  
  
Volume III of the Sun series.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Reno pushed the glaze of sweat off of his filthy face.  
  
He looked about.  
  
The walls were white.  
The kitchen floor no longer grabbed his bare feet from layers of spilt beer, crusty cheese, and fallen sugar.  
The trash was taken out.  
His clothes were cleaned, mended, and hung in the closet.  
His bed was made.  
The dust was vanished.  
The bugs were fumigated, and swept up.   
The bathroom smelt like soap and lemon Pine-Sol.  
Even the fridge was scrubbed free of mold and scum.  
  
Light streamed in through the clear windows...  
  
A weeks worth of labor and nearly a hundred and fifty gil went into it.  
And he wasn't even paid to do this-he thought.  
  
No bets have been made. He was just tiered of living like a slob.   
  
Well, that wasn't the only reason.  
  
Sephris.  
  
Even after all this back-breaking work and many hours of occupying himself, he couldn't get her out of his mind.  
There wasn't much left to DO to keep his mind busy.  
  
Every time he turned on the television, she was there. He saw her on all the pretty-make-up women's faces.  
  
Uhg.  
  
He didn't know what to DO about it.  
He didn't have a lot of money anymore. It would be too expensive and too hard to go out and search for her. He didn't know where to begin.  
Looking for a girl you saw once, a while ago, and only know her first name, and you were halfway across the world at the time, was like looking for a needle in a bloody haystack!!  
It was stupid. He would get over it. Just an infatuation- he told himself over and over again.  
He met lots of girls he had a one-night-stand with when he was a Turk.  
He was in love with all of them.  
  
Sephris seemed a little different, though...  
  
She probably didn't even remember him, let alone care.  
She was like a brief, beautiful, fleeting face in a crowd you never forget, but never see again.  
  
"Only in my dreams. Fuck. Fuck. See, this is why I always hated love. When you want them, you can't have 'em. When you have 'em, they ain't worth gil you spend on 'em to get 'em to sleep with you. Eh? Ain't it the truth. Fuck. Sephris! What are you doing to me! Your KILLING me!" Reno lifted his arms, yelled theatrically in his small living room.  
  
His armpits smelt like something rotten.  
  
Then, there was heavy thumps above him. The small, dangling light fixture on the ceiling waved back and forth under the thudding force.  
  
Then, a dulled but shrill, woman's voice came in through the ceiling's plaster.  
"Stop! That! Yellin'! Down there!"  
  
"Yes, Mrs. Fertino!" Reno lifted his face and called back.  
Then, Reno sat down on his old green Lay-Z-Boy recliner, and turned on a porno at max volume.  
  
Mrs. Fertino thumped her foot for nearly a half hour before she gave up.  
~  
  
  
"Dally, I'm so SICK of that dark BALD guy comin' in, requesting me for a server, never sayin' hello, goodbye, or even leaving a TIP! The fuc-"  
"Hey, hey! Pumpkin, yeah, now, calm down, do you want me to talk to him?" Dally, Yuffie's manager, was a woman whose girth and height met together to create a round ball of a woman in a tight pink waitress dress.  
Yuffie scowled, and glanced behind her shoulder.  
  
There, across the room, was the silent bald man sipping his coffee and reading the paper with a pair of dark sunglasses on.  
  
"Why does he keep requesting me, anyway?" She mumbled to her manager. "Is he some kind of sicko?"  
"Does he ever make passes at you? Like- sexual harassment?"  
"No. I mean. I never really see his EYES, I mean. I just feel dirty around him, like he's checking me out or something. I think I've seen him before, too. He seems like, REALLY, really familiar, Dally. I think I know him from somewhere. He really freaks me out. I wish he'd stop requesting me."  
Dally placed her think, white, dishwater greased hands upon her hips.  
"Listen, sweetheart, do you want me to talk to him or not?" She looked evenly into Yuffie's eyes.  
Yuffie paused, then shook her head.  
  
"No. No. Uhm-"  
"Well, then, doll face, suck it up, and serve him. You'll meet creeps everyday. Live with it." Dally smirked bluntly, and snapped her stained white towel. "Get goin' onto the floor. I don't pay ya to stand, muffin."  
  
Sighing heavily, she went back out onto the floor to re-fill Rude's coffee.  
  
  
  
~  
  
Tifa smirked when she read the headline of Costa Del Sol's newspaper.  
  
It read:  
  
"Grand Opening of Airport:   
Shin-Ra Applauds Highwind for Opening Commercial Flights"  
  
She read the large article beneath the bold and black headline. Beside the column was a rectangular photo of Cid standing beside Shin-Ra president, Dante Julius. Together, with a large pair of scissors, they were smiling and cutting a red ribbon over the new airport runway.  
  
Apparently, they made room for the airport by completely demolishing the Space exploration program, and taking down the remains of the old rocket in rocket town.  
The airport would bring tourism, commercial businesses, jobs, and competition in the region. Tifa was very proud of Cid.  
She wondered if he would ever remember his friends, after all of this.  
She wondered if he ever got the invitation to the wedding.  
  
"Things certainly are changing. Did you see the paper?" Tifa turned the front page towards Cloud.  
Cloud lowered his fork.  
"Wow." He said. A long, sappy drip fell from his waffle.  
  
Tifa and Cloud sat at their kitchen table eating breakfast. Tifa only had a bowl of fruit and a glass of water.  
Cloud had waffles smothered in maple syrup and a cup of coffee.  
  
"Yeah, wow, you big dufus. Read the headline."  
  
"Oh! Wow! That's really cool. Maybe we can go see him sometime by flying over there." Cloud took his forkful of golden waffle goodness, and crammed it into the side of his mouth.  
"Or- even better- he can fly out here using his airline and come visit US, sweetie." Tifa picked at a fresh strawberry that laid there, staring up at her from her plastic pink bowl.  
  
Cloud didn't reply. He only replaced the mouthful of waffles he swallowed with another bite.  
  
"It really would make seeing all of our friends so much easier." Tifa egged the already dead conversation on.  
  
Again, Cloud didn't respond. He continued eating his breakfast.  
  
"I wonder how Red and Reeve are doing." She knew that she was beating a dead horse by continuing to talk. Cloud wasn't at all interested.  
  
After Cloud finished his waffles, he pushed a napkin across his lips and added, "Barret said that he hasn't heard from Reeve in a while, now. They used to keep in close contact. Last I heard, Reeve was working for the Toy department in Shin-Ra."  
  
"I can't believe he has the gull to keep working for Shin-Ra after all of this."  
  
"That's Reeve Sith for ya." Cloud sipped his coffee while leaning in with his elbows on the table.  
  
"Does he know-about-the baby?" Tifa placed her hand on her round abdomen, and looked into Cloud's wide, cornflower eyes.  
  
Cloud shrugged. "No clue. Hopefully we will see everyone again at the wedding."  
  
"I want part of our wedding to be a memorial." Tifa blurted out.  
  
"Memorial? To-"  
  
"Vincent. I want... everyone to honor him. Like, I donno, mention him in a speech or something. He's a friend and FAMILY, Cloud." Tifa retorted hastily.  
  
"Tifa, our wedding is supposed to be a happy time. It's supposed to be about US, and no one else. You never used to be this hung up on Vincent before you found out that he was your half brother. He's still the same Vincent that you never knew. He's just dead now, is all. It's not fair to us."  
  
As Cloud reached across the table to take her soft hands, Tifa awkwardly pushed back her kitchen chair, and stormed out of the room.  
  
~ 


	3. Baby Blue Boy

Three Leaves Left  
  
Volume III of the Sun series.  
  
  
  
  
Reno bent down, and picked up the morning paper from his doorstep.  
  
He was renting out a small section of an old man's house that had several additions put onto it; there was an added door, a kitchen, and a bathroom, as so whomever rented it- never had to see the old man that lived there.  
Mrs. Fertino, the woman that lived above Reno, had the same deal.  
The old man added a lot to his old house, as so he would have people's money coming in.  
He made money without lifting a finger, such is the life of a landlord.  
  
  
Reno had a makeshift front porch; it was one of the things added to his side of the house in Midgar.   
"Hmmm..." A low rumble of thought purred in the back of his unshaven throat.  
  
He stared at the headline news.  
  
"Ex-Turk Once Declared Dead- Found Alive and Working for Shin-Ra."  
It was a scandal headline.   
Scandals sold papers.  
Reno chuckled to himself.   
The article was about Tseng.  
In the photo, Tseng looked like he was completely reveling in his five minutes of fame. He was laughing, and smiling.  
The caption under the photo read:  
"Tseng tells all to journalist, Phoenix Down. Once declared dead, he now finds himself completely penniless. Now with one crippled arm, Tseng struggles back to the top at his new job in Shin-Ra HQ."  
  
Reno stood and read the article top to bottom upon his shadowed, wooden porch.   
His holy, striped boxer-shorts and baggy, brown bathrobe flapped in the dirty wind.  
Morning joggers passed him by as he continued to read the paper. He paid little mind to them. Most of them were regulars to the earliest peaks of the hazy, Midgar dawn.  
  
So when the man with the slicked black hair began to walk down the filthy street, Reno didn't notice.  
  
"Ahoy, there, Reno!" The man stopped in his tracks, and called out to Reno.  
  
Reno looked up, and narrowed his eyes a moment while names flew by his mind. He seemed familiar... The spotless, navy suit. The shiny black shoes. Combed, short, black hair. Certainly wasn't one who came by these Midgar sectors much. He was too much of a open target for mugging...  
  
"Remember me?" The clean cut man called. "The grocery store!?"  
  
Reno wrapped his uncut toenail about his calf, and itched himself.  
Oh. Yeah, -- he thought. HIM.  
  
"Oh, yeah, man, uh, hey." Reno lowered his paper loudly, and tucked it under his hairy armpit. He then reached into his bathrobe pocket for a pack of cigarettes.  
  
The man approached Reno, but didn't climb up the saggy, flaking, porch steps.  
  
"Top of the mornin' to ya." The man chirped happily as he placed his hand upon Reno's railing.  
  
"I didn't catch your name before." Reno spoke while the orange tip of the cigarette became tucked between his teeth. He then took out his lighter.  
  
"Oh, right! Reeve, Reeve from the Shin-Ra." Reeve followed Reno's glare.  
It fell to Reeve's shiny shoe, which happened to be absently resting upon the first step of Reno's dilapidating, tiered-looking porch.  
  
Reeve quickly recoiled his foot from Reno's step.  
  
"We were never friends, Reeve. I don't know why your being all touchy-feely with me all of a sudden, frankly, I'm suspicious of what your motivation might be. What the fuck do you want, so I can get you off of my property." Reno lifted his chin, and looked down at Reeve coldly.  
With a slow exhale, he squeezed the smoke from his lungs, the same way a finger squeezed the trigger of a gun.  
  
Reeve suddenly felt small as he stood far lower than Reno on the polluted Midgar floor.  
  
Reno's eyes were gem-green stones.  
Reeve looked up to them, as if searching for something, words perhaps.  
He found nothing in his fellow-man's dirty, dry face.  
  
"Listen, Reno. We... we got something in common. We are more alike than you realize, really, we are. We both don't trust anyone, and both only use people for what they are worth, and then leave 'em. Neither one of us has a SIDE, really. I mean-"  
  
"You know what, mother-fucker, Tseng spent his whole life tryin' to kill you, and I'm just sorry now to realize that he hasn't." Reno removed the cigarette from his lips, and directed his sharp, long index finger to Reeve forehead, emphasizing his point. "But I can make up for Tseng. I CAN kill you. I got a shut gun, right here behind my front door, mother-fucker, and if you don't get off my property in three seconds, I'm gunna reach back here, pull it out, and fill your head with lead, get my drift..." Reno flicked his cigarette ash onto Reeve's suit.   
It exploded in a flurry of gray and black speckles.  
Reeve paused, then brushed it away.  
  
He tightened his black, thin, tie and cleared his throat. "Reno. Tseng works in the floor right below me. He's planning on killing you. I know. I overheard him through the ventilation system, near the Shin-Ra bathrooms. He's tried killing me, and I thought that if he worked together..." Reeve reached into his jacket pocket, and pulled out the morning paper.  
It was in a tight roll. As he held it, it un-folded like a scroll, revealing Tseng's picture and the headline.  
"We could get him before he gets us."  
  
Reno didn't say anything.  
However, his arm reached backwards, pushing open his creaking front door.  
While keeping solid eye-contact with Reeve, Reno grabbed his 'shot gun.'  
  
Reeve simply turned around, and began walking away.  
  
  
Reno didn't have a shot-gun. He bluffed. He grabbed his umbrella.  
  
~  
  
  
  
"Tifa, open the bloody door, I want to talk to you." Cloud wound his arms about his chest like two, thick, pink coils.   
He had just about enough of this.  
The arguing.  
The fights.  
It was always about the wedding plans.  
  
Why did something so simple have to be so complicated? It was JUST a CEREMONY.  
  
He heard her sobbing through the bedroom door as he stood in the hallway.  
  
Cloud un-locked his arms, and looked at his digital watch. It was 11:32 PM already. She should be trying to sleep, not dragging on this argument-he thought.  
  
"Tifa, come ON. Fine. Uhm. Listen. I'm SORRY, I was WRONG, ok?! Is that what you want to hear?"  
  
"Just go away. Your only saying that. You don't mean it. Your just saying your-sniff-wrong, so I'll open the fuggin door. Sniff."  
  
Cloud gave a forced, exasperated, sigh. He grunted, and threw back his head. 'Why are women so-' "Fine. Tifa. Your right. 'I'm only saying that so I'll open the door.' I DON'T think I'm right. I'm scum, ok? I'm SCUM, Tifa, you hear me!? SCUM!!!" Cloud screeched.   
  
Then, there was silence.  
  
  
Tifa giggled.  
  
"I just, ok, listen, here is MY side of things, Tifa. I just don't think that OUR WEDDING is the TIME or PLACE for Vincent's memorial, ok? If YOU wan to mention him, that's FINE with me! Do what you want, I am just giving you MY OPINION."  
"...I know." Tifa said as she leaned her back against the bedroom door. She then slid down, and sat on the floor.  
  
"Just open the door, now, so I can get ready for bed, ok? I'm tiered. And I'm REALLY tiered of arguing these stupid little things with you. I just want to crawl into bed, and hold you, and..."  
  
"Cloud?" Tifa gulped.   
  
"...What now?" Cloud rubbed his temples.  
  
"I think my water just broke..."  
  
"Are you sure it's not another contraction?"  
  
"There is SHIT, wet SHIT on the FLOOR Cloud. Under my legs."  
  
"Oh. God. OPEN THE DOOR!"  
  
"Uaaahhg.. Ah. It hurts. It's coming. Oh my god. Cloud."   
  
"OPEN THE DOOR!"  
  
"I can't!" Tifa cried. "I can't stand! Oh, Cloud, It hurts! I'm blocking the door, and I can't stand up! He'll fall out!"  
  
"He WON'T fall out, Tifa, I promise, open the door!"  
  
Tifa began to wail, and pant heavily. She remembered to breathe.  
Cloud hammered on the door, screaming at her to move and open it. Finally, Tifa struggled enough out of the way for him to squeeze through.  
  
Cloud, not owning a car, called 911.  
The ambulance came, taking them both to the hospital.  
  
It took Tifa over 27 hours of labor.  
The baby boy was born in the earliest hours of the morning.  
  
  
~  
  
"Stars shining bright, above you. Night breezes seem to whisper, 'I love you.' Birds singing in the sycamore tree, dream a little dream of me..."  
  
  
  
"Boy, that Yuffie, I didn't think she'd EVER get over her stage fright."  
  
"She's the queen of Karaoke."  
  
"Shh!"  
  
  
"...Sweet dreams, till sunbeams find you, sweet dream, that leave your worries behind you, but in your dreams, whatever they'll be, dream a little dream of me!"  
  
  
"She has the voice of an angel, so sweet, an innocent."  
  
  
  
"Stars fading, but I linger on! Still craving your kiss! I'm longing to wait till dawn, dear, just craving your kiss. Sweet dreams till sunbeam find you, sweet dreams dear, that leave your worries behind, dear."  
  
  
  
"Yeah, she sings, well, I mean, her voice is like a little girls, but, she can carry a tune."  
  
"She IS a little girl." Dally snapped her towel across her shoulder as she spoke to the older man at the bar. The man didn't reply, he only stroked his mustache, then glanced to the triangular lighting on Yuffie.  
  
  
  
  
"Dream a little dream of me!"  
  
  
  
Rude hissed at the older man to keep quiet.  
Yuffie knew that Rude was in the audience.  
Butterflies fluttered and danced from her stomach into her throat. Her singing voice grew quieter. She was always nervous when he was around. There was something creepy about him.  
  
Who was he? Why was he so familiar? Did he know her from somewhere?  
Why did he keep requesting her as a server?  
  
  
When Yuffie finished her song, the Karaoke announcer in a sparkling purple suit jacket came back and announced a woman and her husband onto the stage. They were going to sing, "Bohemian Rhapsody" badly.  
  
  
Yuffie returned to work. Dally patted her shoulder.  
She received more tips and compliments when she sang. The Karaoke machine was a new addition in the Wutai bar on Wednesday nights, she was making the most of it.  
  
Sometimes her father came in to listen to her.  
She wasn't the best up there, but, she wasn't the worst, either.  
  
She thought that her voice was too high-too little girl. There were some things that she simply couldn't do with her voice.  
She couldn't sound dirty, grindy, or throaty. She always sounded 'pretty' and 'cute,' and she hated it.  
  
Yuffie tried walking past Rude swiftly.  
But he gestured to her for a refill. She cursed to herself for noticing his wave from the corner of her eye.  
  
Reluctantly, she approached him.  
  
"Yes, sir?" She asked with a plastic smile, "Can I help you?"  
  
"Yuh-huh-Yuh-Yuffie... Huh-hm-hi. You... probably... d... don't... huh-remember, n... me." Rude spoke painfully slow, trying his best to not stutter. He also spoke so softly, it was a near gentle whisper.  
Yuffie hesitated, then stepped slightly closer, and turned her head as so her ear faced him.  
She couldn't believe that after all of this time serving him, Rude finally spoke.  
  
"I-knew your f-f-friend, Tifa. 'N, I liked her. A wh-whole lot. Yuffie."  
  
Yuffie turned and looked at him.  
  
In the dim bar light, Yuffie gazed into her stretched and bent reflection in his dark black sunglasses. Her wide hazel eyes went on into a mirrored infinity in a complex expression.  
She pushed her hair away.  
  
"Who are you, what's your name?" She asked back in a equally quiet tone.  
  
"Ruh-Ruh..." He stopped, and bit his lips, "Rude."  
  
"I... didn't know you... talked like that. I'm so sorry." Yuffie "I'm sorry that I didn't talk to you before I mean, I thought that you were just being creepy- ohmygod. Your... You were that Turk, I remember you, now! That was like six years ago! What are you doing here! Are you STALKING me?" Yuffie pulled away from him a few steps, and unconsciously clutched her white apron. "I can kick your ass, you know."  
  
Rude shook his head, and didn't reply.  
  
"Ohmygod. Ohmygod. Jus-just, stay back, Rude, I'm warning you."  
  
"I-duh-don't wuh-want t-t-tih hurt you. I ju-ju-just w-wanted a beer. Uh-and... to talk."  
  
"About what? What are we going to talk about? I can go get my manager. What do you want!?" Yuffie backed away. No one seemed to noticed their conversation at the bar under the dim light, the crowd, and the very bad, loud singing at the Karaoke stage.  
  
"Uh-anything, Yuh-Yuffie."  
  
She blinked, and didn't know what to say.  
  
~ 


	4. Rude's Eyes and Lies

Three Leaves Left   
  
Volume III of the Sun series  
  
  
"Why would Tseng be wanting to kill me? Because, a few years back I stole his girlfriend? Nah." Reno sipped his canned beer.  
"He would have killed me by now if it were that."  
  
Reno looked back to the television screen. "Next on Jerry Springer- midgets stole my trailer trash girlfriend!"  
  
Reno smiled.  
  
The telephone rang.  
  
Reno reached over, and grabbed the receiver.  
His beer threatened to tip over as he clutched the phone.  
  
"Yeah, this is Reno." Reno spoke as he answered.  
  
There was a pause. The television flared with the sound of angry, fat white women in nothing but mis-matched underwear.  
  
"Hello? Fuck." The moment Reno reached over once more to his TV tray to place the phone down, a voice yelled out from the receiver.  
  
"Reno!" The voice in the phone screamed like a hissing sun flare.  
  
Reno took the phone to his ear once more, and dimmed the TV volume. "Yeah?" Reno grunted.  
  
"Guess what?" The voice asked. Reno supposed it was a man's voice, but it was not throaty. It was a light voice, nearly like a husky woman's, or a adolescent boy's.  
  
"What?" Reno lifted his beer, and eyed the can as he slouched in his Lay-Z-Boy.  
  
"I have Sephris with me. If your not willing to help me ice Tseng, then, I may just loose my patience with you, and take it out on her, that's all."  
  
"Reeve!" Reno sat up suddenly, knocking the canned beer over his newly cleaned carpet.  
  
Reeve chuckled.  
  
"You bastard. You can't threaten me. I used to WORK for Shin-Ra. I know all the shots. I was the guy who INVENTED blackmail. You moron. You wouldn't know your foot from your ass. Your supposed to be one of those Cloud Strife-following GOOD guys, you back-stabbing son-of-a-bitch!" Reno flew out of his recliner, and leapt to the window, stretching phone cord's limb to it's limits.  
  
As he spoke, he peered through his window, just to see if Reeve was near-by, on the off-chance.  
  
No one was on the street outside of his home.  
  
The slanted vertical blinds created striped lines across Reno's unshaven face, as if his body were painted in black and white jail-stripes.   
  
"You've got five days to agree to helping me kill Tseng. Otherwise, Sephris is gunna get it, Reno." He added darkly.  
  
"I'm calling your bluff, then, jackass. I ain't helping you do nuthin'!" Reno, then slammed the phone down.  
  
He suddenly himself into his Lay-Z-Boy recliner. Slowly, his ass was engulfed and swallowed into it's all-encompassing, pistachio-green cushions.   
  
He turned up the volume.   
  
Jerry Springer had the sort of expression upon his face that one gets after swallowing raw lemons.  
  
~  
  
Dally noticed Yuffie's complaints dwindling to near zero.  
She also noticed the dark-skinned, bald man in sunglasses come around the bar and grill more often.  
  
The other thing that Dally, Yuffie's manager, couldn't help but notice, was Yuffie actually SMILING at the bald man as she served him coffee.  
Dally thought that them getting along was better for business, nothing else.  
  
Yuffie worked late that Friday night.   
The grill closed at ten, but the bar of Wutai stayed open till two am, or until everyone left.  
  
Noises, smells, clanking ice and spilling alcohol littered every ounce of room in the Wutai bar, Turtle's Paradise.   
Yuffie scuttled around, taking orders and balancing trays.   
Demands were flinging at her left and right.  
She smiled, accepted tips, and tried not to grind her teeth too much from the amount of pain shooting through her feet.  
  
  
She was also used to the men's cat calls; usually they came after 12 am and one too many beers.  
"Hey, sweet-ass, over-here, filler-up!" one man called.   
Yuffie forced a grin, and refilled his beer.  
  
  
Two am rolled around. Dally shoved and shoo-ed the drunks out. The noise died down, and the broken bottles and spilt drinks were eventually becoming swept up.  
The raw stench of men and beer faded side by side with the evaporating moonlight.  
  
As Yuffie bent down to retrieve a dropped tip, she felt a repeated tap on her shoulder. Her round face turned. Her sea-colored eyes met Rude's reflecting sunglasses.  
His heavy, dark hand fell down.  
Yuffie hesitated, looked at it, then took it.  
  
Rude lifted her to her feet.  
  
"Thanks," Yuffie spat out flatly as she brushed her knees off. "I mean, uhm,..." She looked at him in the face, and softened her tone, "Thank you."  
  
"...No problem." Rude offered a thin smile.  
  
"Do you... want to stay a little while? Dally's letting me close. I was thinking that I could put some coffee on brew." Yuffie placed her tip into her apron pocket. Then, she found herself gnawing on her bottom lip.  
  
"Duh-de-caff." Rude nodded.  
  
"What?"  
  
"De-caff. No caffeine, puh-please."  
  
"Oh, right!" She spun around, and went into the kitchen.  
  
Rude sat himself down upon a ripped barstool at the slick counter.  
From the kitchen, Yuffie spoke loudly.  
  
"So, all these years you've had your eyes on Tifa, eh?"  
  
"...Yes." Rude answered.  
  
"She's engaged, you know, to Cloud." Yuffie poked her head through the kitchen door and looked at him sharply.  
  
Rude didn't reply. He sat simply with his fingers tangled together.  
  
"I think it's weird." She sad while dumping a pitcher of water into the coffee maker.  
  
"Whuh-what is?"  
  
"That you have liked someone for so long that you don't even know." A blossom of pink bloomed onto her cheeks and ran hotly down her neck as she spoke. She always had a thing for Cloud. She felt as if she were eating her own words.  
  
Again, Rude was silent.  
  
A trickle of motor-oil-brown liquid began to spill into the coffee pot. Yuffie returned, and faced Rude from the far side of the counter. A wall of green, brown, and clear glass bottles was stacked like a icy mountain behind her.  
  
"Cat's got your tongue?" She asked.  
  
"...No."  
  
"Then, what is it, why so quiet all of a sudden?"  
  
"Got nuthin' t' suh-say."  
  
Yuffie crossed her arms and leaned into the bar.  
"Bullshit. I bet something is on your mind. Why don't you ever take off your glasses?" Exhaustion crept up the spines of Yuffie's eyes as she leaned in closer to Rude. It was obvious that she long to talk, but at the same time, yearned to go home and rest after a night's work.  
  
Rude tilted his glasses, showing her his eyes.  
  
The look on Yuffie's face reflected the horror that began clawing up from her stomach, and into her brain.  
She backed up into the glass bottles, nearly knocking them down onto her in a crashing, knife-like avalanche.  
  
"Oh... my god!"  
  
~  
  
"Oh, my god!"  
  
"Oh, he's beautiful..."  
"Let me... hold him." Tifa begged as she weakly sat up.  
The doctor handed her the new child after he was wrapped into a blue blanket.  
  
Then, the doctors gently took the child from Tifa's motherly spiked fingertips.  
Tifa didn't want to let go. Not now, not ever.  
  
Cloud's face looked like a pale, passed thunderstorm. It seemed as if fear, excitement, and joy were brewing in the cauldron of his head. And all were mixed in such an extreme, it was as if he was going to erupt in a blast of sleep.  
He was collapsed into a pile in a chair beside Tifa's bed.  
  
The doctors weighed and measured the new child, cut his umbilical cord, cleaned him off, then wrapped him into a blew blanket. Upon his disproportional, large head, they tucked a blue wool cap on.  
As the nurse cradled the child in her warm, fat arms, she smiled at Tifa while asking,  
"So, what's he going to be named?"  
  
"Zack." Cloud blurted out in a half-opened-eyed state.  
  
"Keter." Tifa groaned.  
  
The nurse blinked.  
  
"Uh, maybe I'll leave him nameless until you decide." The nurse scuttled out without another word.  
  
Cloud slept in the chair beside Tifa as the doctors tended to Tifa's weak body.  
Everything went well.  
  
  
They had a brand new baby boy.  
His hair was as black as a raven's wing, and his eyes were like two blood drops in his head. 


	5. The Tale

Three Leaves Left   
  
Volume III of the Sun series  
  
  
"Let me tell you a story that is both as true, as it is old. It begins like most stories begin, with a 'Once Upon a Time,' and the well-known ending is like most stories endings: with a happy, 'The End'.  
  
"Once upon a time, there was a great king. He was a wise and wonderful man, who ruled with power, wisdom, and fairness over his people. He had many, many gardens, filled with dreams and beauty.   
"But he was a lonely king, with no woman to call a queen, wife, or had children to call mother.  
  
"The king had a routine to his day, and he wondered if it was this routine that prevented him from meeting anyone.  
And the routine was this:  
Each morning the king would rise, before there was a smattering of light upon the ground, and he would mount his golden chariot, and ride it across the summer sky. As he rode, his goodness followed him, and his goodness and love would fall from his chariot of gold as bright and as strong as hell flame upon his city below.  
"As the goodness and love fell from his chariot, light would spring upon the Earth that was his kingdom, and life would rise.  
  
"He would then return to his castle after his daily ride was over. His castle was buried in the darkness and the stars that flickered silently.  
"One night, after the king retired from his daily ride, he decided to gaze out his tall castle window, and reflect unto himself his loneliness.   
Out in the open darkness, the king saw the stars, and thought of how new and young they looked. For in those days, everything was new, shapeless and wild.  
  
"Gods and goddesses, in those days, still roamed the Earth and lived, fought, cried, and made love like mortals.  
  
"In that open darkness, the king saw a tiny, shiny star, that on first appearance, did not look any more remarkable than any other star.  
However, there was something about it, that made the king quiver. And, for a brief moment, the king forgot his loneliness.  
  
"On the second night, after the king retired, he had completely forgotten the star that he had observed the night before, until he passed his bedroom window, and his eye happened to catch the blanket of dreams that covers the sky ceiling every night.  
  
"There, near the same patch of white speckled sand in the velvet black, was the star.  
  
"As the king clutched the cold stone windowsill, so cold was it that it nipped his fingers, the king felt his heart leave his chest, and fly to the heavens that held the stars so beautiful.  
  
"The moment the king considered leaving his castle, to travel at night abroad to chase his star, out of the sky, his very beloved star came loose, and tumbled to the ground.  
  
"Down, down the star fell in a sheering white streak that came like a tiny tear drop, smearing with salt on the way to Earth on the sky's black cheek.  
  
"Without hesitation, king Sun leapt into his chariot, brining the dawn with him.  
He chased the star to the place where it fell.  
  
"The Sun found himself in a small, dark forest. His horse that pulled the chariot had hair and a tail made of flames, as so when it walked, a bubble of light shielded them from darkness.  
The halo of light melted away a pall mist that hung over the dead forest like a shawl of Spanish moss.  
  
"In the spiny underbrush off in the distance, a small blue glow shivered.  
  
"Quickly, the Sun king approached.  
  
  
"Instead of finding a star there, the king was looking down at a small woman whose exterior glittered like the skin of an opal stone. Her hair fell like azure moonlight down to her shoulders. So strong was the lightening in her eyes, it was as if midnight itself was hers to command.  
  
"Are you the star that fell from the sky?" Asked king Sun.  
  
Instead of replying with a coy, lovely grin, or giggling like a lady, the woman puckered her lips, and spat upon the ground. The king looked upon her spittle that simmered like a shoal of little fish near his foot.  
He offered his hand to her, but she refused it. She pulled herself up to her own feet with her own strength.  
  
"I am no STAR! I am OFFENDED that you think SO poorly of me as to be a STAR. Stars are merely servants to petty gods and goddess whom can't hold their own. Perhaps from your kingdom, though, I look so far away that you may mistake me to be a star. No, lord, I am NO STAR, humph."  
  
"Then who are you, that has captivated the heart of a great king with your beauty?" the Sun king asked as he stroked his beard that was the color of a smoldering fire.  
  
The woman folded her arms across the breast of her torn dress, and replied with dignity, "I am the lady Moon, and I was chasing someone."  
  
"And who were you chasing, may I ask?" The king asked quickly.  
  
"...I was... I was chasing this... this light, to whose origin I know not. Every night I go to bed to sleep, he comes across the sky like a mighty fireball, but much too far away for me to see his face, lord. Over my shadowed realm, he brings life, and warmth. My people long for the blackness, but his light... it is... intriguing. So, leave me lord, to my quest of seeking this man."  
  
"Aye, lady Moon, I will, perhaps then, I can find my star."  
  
"Little did they realize, they, for all eternity chased each other--- thinking that they were chasing someone else- their true loves. The lady Moon and her darkness, and the lord Sun and all of his gold and glory.  
  
  
"Many, many years had passed. Their sons and their daughters from many lovers that they each took through the course of many years roamed the Earth as gods and goddesses.   
However, still the lady Moon chased the Sun, thinking he was her true love, and the lord Sun chased her thinking she was a beautiful, fallen star.   
  
"One day, the lord Sun did not rise and take to his chariot. Lady Moon was devastated to see that light did not fall across her barren land.  
  
"From his castle window, the lord sighed sadly. He looked into the night sky with his head rested upon his folded arms, and thought to himself that it was useless to find the fallen star that taunts him so badly.  
  
"Now, the domain of Hell and the Sun king were both very close. Hell gained it's warmth and power from the Sun king himself. The lord of Hell, a fallen angel whose beauty was as well known as it's power, had wings of a bat, and a face of an angel.  
The lord of the Sun asked in a favor to the angel of perdition and all that was Evil.  
  
"The Sun king looked into the night sky, and asked aloud,  
  
"Lord Lucifer, I call in a favor! If you bring me the fallen star-my true love, to whose beauty I wish to behold, and I will grant you a favor!"  
  
"The lord Lucifer replied in a voice that seemed to come from the Heavens, but really, it came from Heaven's shadow,  
  
"Surely, lord Sun, from king to king, I will grant you this simple favor. For a boon I ask one thing, however, in return." Lord Lucifer seemed only too eager to help.  
  
"Hesitantly, the Sun king complied, "Then what is it, that I may grant for finding me my love-star?"  
  
"Let me have a demon upon Earth. Let him walk unfettered. Do not touch him with your Sun ray, and burn his skin. He will be my child, and mine to command. Let him walk like a man for all eternity. And he is mine." The Lord Lucifer replied.  
  
"The Sun king agreed.   
  
"The lord Lucifer, lord of all Hell, showed the Sun king the star--- keeping true to his word. And to the Sun king's despair, he found out that the one that he had been swooning for, was none other than the lady Moon. Moon was a hard headed, loud mouth- nothing like the Sun king had hoped for a wife.  
  
"The Sun king sank into sadness, having found out that his star was really the Moon, now and forever bound in a chase. For wherever Lord Lucifer goes, so does the wake of pain and destruction. Sun should have never trusted the lord of Hell.  
  
"And so it was, that Lord Lucifer had a demon-child walking the Earth. The child learned to blend into human society seamlessly.  
Lucifer also marked the child. His eyes were not that of a man's, but a demon's.   
The child, when it was born, many years ago, had no idea that it was a demon, however it seemed slightly different, and had a taste for destruction.  
  
"His parents never fully loved him, for they somehow felt that the child was not of their blood.  
  
"And that is the story, however true it may be. There are different versions of the tale, with happy endings.   
Perhaps this is why Rude never removes his sunglasses.   
Perhaps this is why Rude has gone by many, many names as hundreds of years pass.  
Perhaps this is why Rude never learned to love, in the true sense of the word.  
He learned very quickly to hate.  
  
"Perhaps this is why it is called, 'The Sun' series. 


End file.
